Skip to content

Revert audit-intent title bet; link /tbc-audit site-wide - #10

Merged
alexandermayes merged 1 commit into
mainfrom
growth/audit-intent-correction
Aug 11, 2026
Merged

alexandermayes merged 1 commit into
mainfrom
growth/audit-intent-correction

Conversation

@alexandermayes

Copy link
Copy Markdown
Owner

Why

PR #9 retargeted the homepage title at tbc audit, on the premise (recorded in the layout.tsx comment) that it was our largest non-navigational query. Query-level GSC data says the opposite: it's navigational for a competitor, tbc-audit.com — "TBC Audit — DPS Performance Review" — which owns the top of that SERP.

The CTR-vs-position gap is the tell:

query impressions (28d) position CTR
tbc audit 3,449 4.7 0.58%
wow tbc audit 195 3.6 2.56%
tbc audits 22 4.4 4.55%
wow tbc log audit 23 3.1 8.70%
raid audit tbc 24 3.2 12.50%

Position 4.7 should yield 6–8%. The bare term returns 0.58% — ~10x under — while every qualified variant converts 5–20x better. I checked whether the bare term was off-topic traffic (TBC is also a bank, a tire company, an accounting abbreviation); it isn't. Geography is USA/DEU/CAN/AUS, standard WoW distribution. These are WoW players who want the other tool.

Same shape as the wow tbc logs cluster already documented in e18cc04: page-one rankings on somebody else's brand name.

Separately, /tbc-audit wasn't reachable. GSC URL inspection reports sitemap.xml as the only referring URL Google knows for it. The single homepage body link (app/page.tsx:92, fourth below-fold section) was never picked up, and the page hasn't been re-crawled since it shipped on 2026-07-31. So Google kept serving / for the audit queries the dedicated page was built to serve.

What changed

  • app/layout.tsx — root title back to Free WoW Classic & TBC Log Analyzer — ParseForge. Reclaims the length that "Classic" needs (wow classic log analyzer converts at 33%) and stops the homepage competing with /tbc-audit. Description and keywords left alone: the paste-a-URL description stands on its own, and meta keywords are inert.
  • app/components/Navbar.tsx — site-wide TBC Audit link, so the page has a crawlable path that isn't the sitemap.

/tbc-audit keeps its existing title, which already targets the qualified terms rather than the bare competitor-brand query.

Expected payoff

Modest and worth stating plainly: tens of clicks/month, not hundreds. The real headroom is the analyzer cluster (tbc log analyzer #1.9 at 34% CTR, wow tbc log analyzer #1.7 at 28%) — those convert ~50x better than anything in the logs/audit navigational pools.

Verification

  • npx tsc --noEmit — clean
  • npm run lint — clean (exit 0)
  • Runtime rendering not verified — needs a preview deploy.
  • Ranking effect unverifiable by nature — needs deploy plus a few weeks of GSC data.

Follow-up (not in this PR)

  • Request re-indexing for /tbc-audit in Search Console by hand — the API can't submit it.
  • Navbar.tsx:91 carries a site-wide dofollow link to classic.warcraftlogs.com. Useful to users, but it's every-page authority flowing to the site that outranks us on the navigational cluster. rel="nofollow" is a one-line change if wanted — separate decision, small effect.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

https://claude.ai/code/session_01YZK7SW7xHvHGidscPuHDwW

PR #9 retargeted the homepage title at `tbc audit` on the premise that it
was our largest genuine-tool-intent query. Query-level GSC data says
otherwise: it's navigational for the competitor tbc-audit.com.

- `tbc audit`: 3,449 impressions, position 4.7, 0.58% CTR — roughly 10x
  below what position 4-5 should yield.
- Qualified variants convert 5-20x better: `wow tbc audit` 2.56%,
  `tbc audits` 4.55%, `wow tbc log audit` 8.70%, `raid audit tbc` 12.50%.
- Geography is USA/DEU/CAN/AUS (normal WoW distribution), so the bare term
  isn't off-topic traffic — it's WoW players who want the other tool.

Same shape as the `wow tbc logs` cluster already documented in e18cc04:
page-one rankings on somebody else's brand name.

Two changes:

- layout.tsx: restore "Free WoW Classic & TBC Log Analyzer — ParseForge".
  Reclaims the title length that "Classic" needs (`wow classic log
  analyzer` converts at 33%) and stops the homepage competing with
  /tbc-audit for the audit queries that page is built to serve. Keywords
  and description are left alone — the description's paste-a-URL framing
  stands on its own, and meta keywords are inert.
- Navbar.tsx: site-wide "TBC Audit" link. GSC URL inspection reported
  sitemap.xml as the only referring URL for /tbc-audit; the single
  homepage body link (page.tsx:92, fourth below-fold section) was never
  picked up, and the page hasn't been re-crawled since it shipped.

/tbc-audit keeps its existing title, which already targets the qualified
terms rather than the bare competitor-brand query.

Verified: tsc --noEmit clean, eslint clean. Ranking effects unverified by
nature — needs a deploy plus a few weeks of GSC data.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YZK7SW7xHvHGidscPuHDwW
@vercel

vercel Bot commented Aug 10, 2026

Copy link
Copy Markdown

The latest updates on your projects. Learn more about Vercel for GitHub.

Project Deployment Actions Updated (UTC)
parseforge Ready Ready Preview Aug 10, 2026 4:45am

@alexandermayes
alexandermayes merged commit a7499e4 into main Aug 11, 2026
5 checks passed
alexandermayes added a commit that referenced this pull request Sep 22, 2026
- Add 03-07-SUMMARY.md: Phase 3 live in production (dpl_6Pj5Lz5Q1tSJYSCtUu3YTvtRx3mx),
  item-7 and share-rate figures counted, Part 5 closed LEFT OPEN — not signed
- REQUIREMENTS.md: OPS-01 Addendum 3 (Phase 3 gate re-run not met) and a new
  SHARE-01/02/03 addendum (capability proven live; live-traffic/human-review
  backstops still open) — no checkbox reverted, ledger made honest via addendum
- WINDOWS.md: two new open follow-ups (#10 item-7 re-measure, #11 share-rate re-run)

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
alexandermayes added a commit that referenced this pull request Sep 22, 2026
Closes the one FAILED truth in 03-VERIFICATION.md (ROADMAP SC4 / OPS-01): all nine
docs/OPS-01-SHIP-GATE.md Part 5 rows are driven to a dated outcome.

- 03-08 (wave 6): the Search Console pass that was never run (rows 4-6) plus the three
  developer-only backstops — D-04 tone, real Discord unfurl, D-13 phone width (rows 7-9).
  Leads with a tracer that takes the homepage row end-to-end.
- 03-09 (wave 7): item-7 re-measure on a fully elapsed busier UTC window, the Vercel Web
  Analytics read for threshold 3, and the RESEARCH A3 consent-path disposition (rows 1, 3).
- 03-10 (wave 8): the date-gated share-rate row (no query before 2026-09-23T09:15Z), the
  Part 5 close-out and exactly one sign-off, REQUIREMENTS Addendum 4 plus a superseding
  SHARE addendum, and the WINDOWS #9/#10/#11 dispositions (row 2).

Every tool-dependent step names who holds the tool: the executor has no PostHog, Vercel,
Search Console or browser tool, so that evidence arrives as a blocking checkpoint and is
transcribed verbatim (the 03-07 handoff pattern). 03-REVIEW.md WR-01/WR-02/WR-03/IN-01 are
explicitly deferred to /gsd-code-review --fix.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
alexandermayes added a commit that referenced this pull request Sep 22, 2026
…gers

- Append OPS-01 Addendum 4 (supersedes Addendum 3): Phase 3 re-run met
  2026-09-19 against dpl_6Pj5Lz5Q1tSJYSCtUu3YTvtRx3mx, Part 5 SIGNED
  (conditionally on the D-14 re-read appending a dated confirmation
  or correction on/after 2026-09-23T09:15Z)
- Append SHARE-01/02/03 Addendum 2 (supersedes 2026-09-16 addendum):
  live-PostHog and D-13 backstops now closed; real Discord unfurl and
  first-hand D-04 verdict remain open
- Both additions are pure appends; every prior addendum, the
  Phase 1 gate closure text, and all checkbox/traceability lines
  are untouched
- Mark .planning/WINDOWS.md #10 fixed (item-7 re-measure closed);
  #9 and #11 stay open per the close-out's dated dispositions

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

This branch was successfully deployed

1 active deployment
Preview — 390b2d9e Deployed Aug 7, 2026 by vercel[bot]
Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment

Labels

None yet

Projects

None yet

Development

Successfully merging this pull request may close these issues.

1 participant